Richard Blank 4:38
That’s an excellent question. And a lot of your audience may not be aware of Costa Rica or Panama or even Nicaragua, this is Central America, the proximity to the United States and Canada. We’re right there. I’m on mountain timezone. It could be a couple hour direct flight out of Florida, and in Costa Rica, we have a democratic society. So Do not have a standing army, the government decided to put that money back into education. So there’s a 95% literacy rate. They claim that Costa Rica has a very neutral accent. So it’s something that’s more attuned to the North American market. And we have a very strong infrastructure. And so the labor pool that we have here, we’re able to boast of Amazon, HP, Intel and Oracle, those companies decided to invest and grow in Costa Rica. So the labor pool here is highly intelligent, extremely capable, very much coachable. And call centers pay more than most vocations. So if you’re a talented salesperson, collector or a top supervisor, you may earn more than an attorney or possibly a doctor, the individuals that enter the center or have such great education backgrounds.
Rolando Rosas 5:48
Now, that’s fascinating, because you would think typical call center, you’re thinking the labor there, you’re paying three bucks an hour or something like that, and a lot of the offshore call centers. But given that you said Amazon, and I’ve had to interact with some of the Amazon support people and they’re when they’re routed, a lot of times, if they’re not one of the India call centers, the other call center is in in Costa Rica. And I’ve found that my interactions when I’ve had an opportunity to interact with folks within their Costa Rica call center, they’re generally very positive.
Richard Blank 6:22
There is a por vida mindset here, if your life, you mentioned two things earlier, my friend, you’re talking offshore, and $3. And you’re 100% correct on that. Costa Rica and Panama, we’re near shore. And it’s not $3, you’re talking about the jewel in the Switzerland of Central America. So we are competing in the sort of skill set you have, you’re not going to be able to get for $3 you can offer it doesn’t mean somebody’s going to take it. So a lot of the phone calls that you and I get, we have to make sure and it’s not hard selling. It’s really no surprises in consulting, as long as we can share what the labor laws are and what the sort of expectations are the agents or the clients that you’re looking for. Then we are a good fit for some people.
Rolando Rosas 7:06
Interesting to talk about good fit for a moment. And before we do before we go talk about good fit and which folks would be right for your type of services. When it comes to call centers, and maybe in this case, boiler room type operations and Hollywood version of what goes on in a call center, obviously, over glamorized in some ways, but a little bit stereotypical, probably of the old days. Is this what’s going on in call centers nowadays are
Richard Blank 7:35
It can, it’s a vertical, there’s five things we do not put a Costa Rica’s call center. I don’t do sports books, casinos, stocks, pharmacies are sweepstakes, I’ve nothing against it. You could take glamorizing maybe just on the set and the suits that they’re wearing. But there are individuals that have that sort of skill set to be able to give her bottles. Now, what I noticed there is a couple things, we’re talking about stock, and there is a sense of urgency. So that’s why maybe they’re a little bit more aggressive than assertive. Once again, if you’re doing specific outbound lead generation for a company, you may not need to press that much. And also, the people have to decide to make those sorts of phone calls. If you’re flipping the page three, and you’re telling somebody that you’re the vice president of the company, and you’re not, in my opinion, you may be compromising ethics, values and morals. And so you can decide not to make those calls, you shouldn’t have to sell your soul for $1, or golden fiddle. This is a very strict Catholic country here, I have to ensure that the agents go home and tell their parents what they do for a living. I myself, I’m very selective of the campaigns that do come into Costa Rica’s call center. So there might be things that are gray area or do not make sense. And I politely reject them. Because as much as I accept them and try to offer them, the agents might not take them. And what I like to see my friend is the art of speech, taking away the stock and maybe doing something ethically, these are incredibly advanced communicators, and they’re also doing intense, active listening and taking copious notes in order to move conversations forward, I’m seeing certain skills that can be put across any sort of phone calls, which is named dropping the certain pauses that they’re doing confirmations, high energy levels, if you see when individuals are standing up, and they’re using their body language that’s expressive as well. So if you had to have me grade them ethically, I would give them very low grades. But if we’re looking at something objectively, through their artists speech, they’re extremely talented, and it should be noticed. It’s just a shame that some of the examples that we see through boiler room Glengarry Glen Ross, and other movies like The prime gig, where it has to show things that compromise ethics because you have other areas. If you study a certain movie about Inbound customer support, you might make the best friend ever. Someone could change your life. And we have certain campaigns where people are calling in like I have a law firm that I work with, and we’re speaking to people on some of the worst days of their life. If when they have been terminated or they’re having issues, and so we need to extend those sorts of phone calls and not rush and take very good notes that people can calm down and be able to convert the call. And so the agents when they get off of that sort of color are exhausted. But they also should feel fine. I appreciate you sharing this with me, because look at me right now. And I could show you the floor, right? It’s not like watching the movies, there are many environments that once again, handling other different types of phone calls, but still have that sort of passion. In order to be able to assist the customer.
Rolando Rosas 10:34
Richard, would you say that what you do is the norm we’ve I’ve interacted with big call centers, small call centers, over 20 years I’ve been I’ve walked floors of a lot of call centers, myself and I def, there’s all kinds of different environments. Would you say what you’re doing is the exception to the rule or is the norm for what is in a call center today? Your approach that you just talked about?
Richard Blank 11:00
Rolando, I can choose one topic where I easily get a gold medal, and I guarantee nobody’s matched me on this. I have a gamification. Call Center culture, putting away the equipment, the training the scripts, we can compare apples, but ask all these call centers, especially Amazon’s 1000s of agents does Jeff Bezos play American pinball with this vehicle, they have an air hockey machine in
Rolando Rosas 11:26
his mansion that’s up the street from here,
Richard Blank 11:29
I’m talking about the three locations in Costa Rica that house 1000s of agents, they have all the bells and the whistles do they have a classic retro arcade game room free play, of course, where people can play machines as far back as the 80s and 90s, where they can let off steam recharge batteries, spend time with me and meet people from other departments. So initially, my company culture is the balance between work and play. And I also include recess in my job here. So anything of nothing, I’ve reduced attrition, people become best friends here. And they are not laggard after lunchtime of McDonald’s, these people are motivated through hand eye coordination, and keeping that momentum, the game rooms packed. And so if anything of nothing, if it was a call center or any other business, I would have, I would guarantee to have games there. So clients and the employees would enjoy themselves, that helps people relax, that puts them in their balance in their focus in order to be absorbing, coaching and growing with the company.
Rolando Rosas 12:32
And would you say, Richard, that doing this, this, I would almost look at it as a holistic approach to an employee, rather than just the skill sets that they bring is it seems like you have an approach to try to maximize productivity by looking at the entire the entire being, I would say, of a person that’s on site at your location that you said they can get stressed out. And I’m sure that even with the clip I just showed you with what people get stressed out, especially in those kinds of environments, their metrics, I’m sure you have metrics in place and goals. But the way that you’re going about getting the best out of your employees is by looking at the whole employee rather than just the numbers.
Richard Blank 13:14
Of course, and there’s a lot of things that they do outside of the office, which may affect their performance here. And we also ensure that when they are making these calls that we give them their sort of quality assurance support, and we grade them. But it’s really more about balance since English is their second language, they’re fulfilled from this job compared to in the United States where they could see telemarketing is transitional are looking down upon it, there are getting a return on their investment. I also let them notice that what they’ve done by learning a second language is 10 times harder than any campaign I’ll put them on. And if they look at is once again an art form, where they can really do some intense active listening and participate. They’re going to really enjoy their job a little bit more. But here’s the thing, my friend you mentioned in my bio, and I really do appreciate you sharing that with your audience. I came here at 27. And I worked in my friends call center for four years now I did this not as a C level, I was with the proletariat, I saw the good and the bad. And it enabled me to find areas in which to enhance the experience because I made the calls received the call sat in the cubicle. And so when I’m with my people, I get it. But it’s very important for synergy, because this is a very social environment that people can feed off of that energy. And one of the things that COVID did was create a work from home environment, I was able to survive and adapt. But one of the things about a call center is that sort of environment that people can grow. And I’ve seen that limited some of the onboarding speed for some people when they do things virtually compared to on site, but I just want people to be raw like a painting compared to a print because if they just make the calls and go through the motions, they’re grinding it But if they take each call with that sort of passion that we saw on your video and how you and I are discussing our own industries, I think they’ll be pleasantly surprised and the sort of positive reinforcement that they’ll get when they’re speaking with people for the first time.
Rolando Rosas 15:13
And it’s so important to understand where people are coming from, what motivates them and how to get the best out of them. And I want to know what your take is like, because you talked, you said, You survived the COVID of just COVID Scare, pretty much that happened. I’d love to hear your story. I remember March 2020, we had one of our larger suppliers was going to fly from China with a team of people to our office. And just days before they were to fly out. They said, Rolando, we can’t come out the company has forbid us from flying out from China to the States, we’re probably going to have to reschedule for a couple of weeks from now. Okay, that’s fine. I was looking forward and the song and dance as you normally do when when those folks come out. And that turned into months. And I would just love to see where you were at. And what was your mindset when you basically started seeing that, oh, my goodness, these events are closing down. Oh my goodness, we got to send people home what was going on in the call center operation and live what you pulling out the hairs that you had? Or was it like, oh my god, this is a freak out. We got to send everybody home, we got to scramble, we got to get tech, some tech in place for people to call from home what was going on.
Richard Blank 16:27
The first thing is I should have never been here in the first place. This is a one. So every day to me is paradise. I always became very humble. When things like that happen. It grounds you. And it’s interesting, you can really judge someone’s true character during chaos. I didn’t pull hair out, I didn’t curse at people. In fact, quite the opposite. I saw a lot of people that I expected to step up to the plate that disappointed me and other individuals that really showed me leadership and character and grid that assisted us in making it through. But for me, personally, I wanted to double down on my own health, there’s really no excuses. So hitting the gym and health and sleeping and eating well, I had to set the example of not a weak man, but a strong man, I could weather this storm. And thankfully, my industry was not pure brick and mortar, like a restaurant or a bike shop, where I was capable of doing things virtually, it did take away a little bit of our culture. But I was so fortunate that my industry was capable of doing things like this now, we kept the communication channels and to ensure that we had a station available for them in case there was a disruption with internet electricity or something with their computer. But the people enjoyed it, they’re spending more time with their families, they’re saving money. Now it’s a give and take. And as long as I can make that sort of adjustment, and when I speak with them be very sincere that it’s nice to see them and I dress for them and listen to certain recordings and mentioned the great work they’re doing, it’s fine, we’re still getting the same sort of performance and metrics out of it. As I just mentioned before, we’re just not breaking bread as much as we used to. But you no one knew what was happening, borders are closed on 3000 miles away from my mother and father. And as I mentioned, the best thing you can do is just keep a level head Oh, and here’s the best part about it. It’s like acorns for the winter, I save money, I’m very conservative. So whatever sort of financial setback or any sort of disruption, I could easily handle that. So my agents would still be able to receive their money, I am able to pay my taxes. And those are the sorts of things that allow you to rest it now you don’t need to compound your stress
Rolando Rosas 18:45
and wood in now that obviously, depending on what part of the country you are in, obviously some places are doing far better than others when it comes to the pandemic and COVID are more of your employees choosing to work from home or you guys given the said work from home and wanted to circle back on that because you’re in an environment I’m sure not immune to how people want to live. Now, like you mentioned, they want to be able to have a little more balance in their life. People have reassessed. Are you guys providing the opportunity for folks to work from home? Or is that something that’s just not an option right now 100%.
Richard Blank 19:21
I keep people on site for PCI compliance, brand new agents that are onboarding or just people with nothing bad homeless, but maybe not the perfect conditions to work from home noise or electricity. And maybe hybrid maybe come in once a week, once a month, just to see you. And just to say hi so we can celebrate and give you a hero’s welcome. But now things have changed. In fact, when we are scaling new accounts, a lot of the top qualified prospects have leverage they do ask for work from home. The only thing I ask for in return is to at least get to know you for a little bit coming for a couple of days of at least a week, and then I’ll send you home. So at least I know who you are with And sit together, do some training and laugh and one game of pinball, and at least you have enough of our culture to take with you. So we’re not completely virtual, because if something like that happens, there is a real connection.
Rolando Rosas 20:11
You know, within this. So in this new environment, as we’ll call it, that’s a little more hybrid. What would you say if you had to give advice for other folks that are still wrestling? Because there’s, there’s folks in the US that are still not sure should we be fully hybrid? Should we go bring everybody back in strong arm everybody back in lock the doors, or the way of some have gone completely virtualized? Seems like for you, there’s some compliance regulations that you have to abide by which restrict some of that? What kind of advice would you have for folks that are still wrestling with that whole work from home thing and what to do?
Richard Blank 20:46
Thank you for bringing that up. I just think it revolves around good or bad habits. You and I are capable of working out of our homes, we don’t need to have people looking over our shoulders to complete our work and put in a full day. And of course, there’s some Joker’s out there that like to do shenanigans, and people tease about making calls in your underwear or your pajamas, or just waking up five minutes before shift and may or may not happen, I don’t know. But it’s really more about your own self respect, I think when you were coming into the office, regardless of the travel time, I understand that could take a long time and be uncomfortable, you still were getting up taking a shower, brushing your hair, doing some breakfast, you had a routine, you had something going you, you want to look nice, you want to see people. And by taking that sort of stuff out, you might not even be making your bed in the morning like you used to. And so these are the sort of habits that I think have a ripple effect, then you can almost see it in somebody. And so I think it should be done not as a reward system when you’re dangling bacon bit in front of a puppy dog, but should be something where if someone earns it, and it is part of your culture, and a parent can spend time with their family or their parents, I think that’s a beautiful thing. And once again, there are outside factors that influence work performance. And if somebody does a better job there, don’t be selfish. I know you miss them by the coffee machine or the water cooler. But if this is a single mother, if there’s someone taking care of their parents, if it’s a long distance, or if they just have a gorgeous house, and they can sit by a window and work there compared to a cubicle, just compare the apples in regards to their work. And if they’re doing a great job, then by all means, as a leader, adjust.
Rolando Rosas 22:36
You can that’s well set at been for us being virtual is not anything new. We’re actually 100% virtual, we’re not have all those regulations in our particular industry. We don’t we’re not in a field where the PCI folks or any financial things that we’re doing restrict us from where we need to operate, have employees. But I can certainly see how times have changed. And somebody said this recently, to me things is exactly as things have changed. And if things have changed, the only way you’re going to thrive in an environment like that is to roll with the changes. If you fight the changes, you’re going to be inundated with a lot of stress. And I don’t think we’re putting that genie back in the bottle when it comes to people work from expectations around work and what they want out of work. I know that you’ve been you know what it’s like being living in the US and living in Costa Rica, where people probably work is not number one. And everything else is a far number two and three, probably a lot more to maybe two or three where it was social structure is different. And familiar is important for a lot of folks and getting the most out of life. And work is just a part of that, rather than working for the ride.
Richard Blank 23:49
They do have responsibilities being from Panama me living in Costa Rica, these are multi generational families, you are taking care of your parents and grandparents sometimes and you’re mentioning change. But I also believe in consistency as well. You can have two variables. And my consistency once again is the empathy. I put myself in their shoes and show the compassion towards this work from home. And I can’t force someone if they’re afraid of their health, especially in the beginning with the gels and the masks and the distancing. It’s almost trying to wash a kitty cat. They just got their paws out and don’t want to go in the bathtub. And so you could they could always quit and then nobody wins. And so it’s okay to bend and demotivate somebody and see what you can do. But you should never really give an ultimatum because in the end, you will lose. And these people will move on to other opportunities and what you brought up, but I didn’t miss those old days Rolando in the rows. Those are fun.
Rolando Rosas 24:50
You don’t let me ask you something. Let me roll back a few seconds is churn and turnover. It’s a thing now for a lot of places and I know you have a different approach to your opera ations Have you been able to successfully keep churn and burn at a minimum, even with your your philosophy towards work? Or have you just not been immune to what’s happening with folks moving and shifting around and looking for different opportunities?
Richard Blank 25:16
Of course, I have, in fact, I get disappointed that I do angry because I sometimes don’t get two weeks notice. But Rolando, let me share something with you, that gives me peace of mind, I have more of a natural attrition than a forced attrition, I’ll lose somebody because of a scheduling conflict because of the university, their boyfriend or girlfriend works there might be close to their home. And sometimes they just pay more. But very rarely, will somebody say that I deface them, I made them cry, gave them the walk of shame, made them feel terrible. And that’s why they’re quitting. And so I’m okay with that. My only thing is my responsibility to the client. Because if somebody leaves me immediately to go work at Amazon, the next day, I am responsible, filling that seat and calling my clients. So it would have been nice to since you started strong with me and gave me all the bells and whistles out you’re there for 15 rounds until the end. And all of a sudden, you’ll leave on a Wednesday without letting me know. And those are the sorts of mature, responsible, ethical actions that I would expect from people, you don’t need to sell your soul and work with me for the next 100 years. But there is that sort of mutual consideration that we have towards one another just shouldn’t be duck goose and used and left to the side. That’s the price that you pay. We I am accountable for this business. And I can hold my head up high and know that I treated everyone with self respect and reliance and confidence. And I did my best to encourage them. So if a client says to me my exit interview, or what happened, I will definitely let them know what happened. But I think everybody knows that my intentions, were always honorable with these agents. So if they happen to leave, it’s something that I don’t take personal. It’s just part of the game.
Rolando Rosas 27:04
And part of the game is also I’m sure that people would like to know, what does success look like from you’re talking about clients? How do your clients measure success? Or how would you measure success when you’re talking about client campaigns? And knowing that you’re achieving the goals are generally what does success look like? Do you have a certain set of numbers and metrics for each agent? Or is it different based on the client needs?
Richard Blank 27:35
Personally, me spiritually Success for me is how many families can I feed a month, because money can always go just want something that’s higher value than just earning $1. But in regards to my clients, it’s really about proper preparation, and no surprises. Just give me all the resources. So I can be on a level playing field, be specific, measurable, let’s agree upon things realistic and timeframe oriented. And because you and I are experts in an industry, it’s very easy for us, since we know certain things to walk backwards, and understand that someone might be facetious or over exaggerating, without trying to insult them. And it’s just one of those things, I’d rather be more of a consultant and from an educated point of view, they move forward and make a decision. I cannot do offshore pricing, I have to explain why sometimes because of the labor laws, and why my prices are different from the United States and some of the expectations in regards to overtime. Once again, expecting me to not have a complete rebuttal script, list, email, phone number from the client, if these are the sorts of things that will allow us to make these calls in good faith and make very nice impressions. Because if the agent is not comfortable with the sort of procedure and structure of these calls, they’re not going to do it. And so as much as I keep trying to flip that seat and bring people in, there might be an issue. And so these are the sorts of preventative measures that I like to discuss prior to moving forward and starting to make phone calls with.
Rolando Rosas 29:03
Well, let’s expand on that. What would you say? Let’s just say what are the top three mistakes that you see when it comes to folks that are out there looking for a new place to park their call center business? Where what would you say if you had to put it out there for somebody to say, hey, look, if you’re looking for a new place to park your business, these are the top three mistakes that I see when people or businesses are looking for new Call Center Service.
Richard Blank 29:31
Patience because they sometimes people want to test you for one seat for one day to see if it could be a successful campaign. I believe in four quarters of a football game at least give us at least one month to try and not just one each and at least a minimum of three so you can compare apples and have an odd man out. And so I just want somebody to give it at least time to invest in the process. There might be a first draft of a script that might be adjusted when we’re making these phone calls. How is your voicemail script? Are you custom making it? Are you allowing us to do the due diligence in regards to the validity of your script or viewer? List that all the information is updated? And where it needs to be? And are we once again, given all of our resources in case people ask us certain follow up questions? Are we able to answer them? Have you given us a cheat sheet? Do you have recordings for us, it’s somebody from corporate that might be able to assist us in our ramp up. And if it’s just a brand new campaign, not even a script or anything, at least once again, let’s just put all of our resources together like Lennon, McCartney, and create something beautiful, because I always believe in right bus right seat. So we might have the right agent at my company, but he might not be on the right vertical or campaign. So these are the sorts of things and testing until you get your foundation and then you can build upon that momentum. And so it’s not as easy as some people think, and don’t kid yourself, I don’t have a line of 50 people outside waiting to work for you for $1 that people that showed in that video, they are earning 1000s of dollars a month down here with those sorts of skill sets and may not accept your $1 campaign. So you might need to have an incentive structure. And you might need to deal with first downs to touchdowns to make two different types of incentives.
Rolando Rosas 31:17
To expand on that, because that’s an interesting thing. So you can your potential clients can set up an incentive structure with you to incentivize those agents that are working on those campaigns.
Richard Blank 31:31
Of course, you should do it many different ways. A lot of people do it. And I don’t believe in this and just attendance records or how many calls you make. I don’t like that I think you should be graded more on high quality control scores where you’re using a lot of soft skills and doing positive escalations, where you’re getting gatekeepers names and doing it verbally and written at the end of a conversation and you should be using military alphabet, you should know your rebuttals, you should be doing name drops, using the pronouns to keep them back into the conversation and keep their attention. If something goes off topic for a minute, like you and I are talking about how beautiful boca de Toro Panama is, we could talk about that for how was Yeah, and maybe you should, because if you and I are speaking for the first time, it’s just one way to put business aside loosened a tie, and really have a couple laughs together and some great thoughts. And when somebody shows that active listening and makes those sort of connections, I give them the highest grades because they’re being artists, and they’re really engaged. They’re really interested. And I think that they, once again, that energy is what spreads on the floor.
Rolando Rosas 32:34
Here comes a pro tip. All right, Richard, you we’re talking about some interesting qualities that maximize those soft skills, or that are really the skills that you really want in somebody to really assess the type of job and incentive for your clients. Go ahead and retouch on that topic.
Richard Blank 33:03
I find it’s very important to use names, and having a positive escalation for a gatekeeper or others that have assisted you in getting this appointment. It’s very important to mention them verbally and in writing. You should also always have a confident and empathetic tone when you’re on the phone, do not mirror image or match somebody that’s aggressive. I also believe in studying people’s rate of speech and how loud they speak, because there might be an inconsistency there. And if it’s a first time phone call, it might be the perfect time to interject and ask a follow up or clarification question. And military alphabet to me is key. Because sometimes you assume that you understood the email address, and then you write something and it bounces back, it takes an extra second, just to verify somebody’s name, even if it’s exotic, because it will show real interest. And if you’re filling out information, make sure it’s correct, because emails that bounce back is terrible, what a waste of time. And these are the sorts of soft skills that if you happen to call a company back, and you would mentioned a compliment to the owner of the company from the individual that assisted you. They’ll remember you, they’ll tell you more about the company culture, and make suggestions in regards to anniversaries, promotions, or other sorts of things that you may be able to talk about with the owner of the company prior to any sort of contracts. And so as long as you do the old school way of rapport building and relationship building, and just show some real active listening on the columns, you’re doing exceptionally well but the most important thing is dedicated practice. Rolando you make this podcast look easy. Imagine what Arabic and Buffy you don’t see them in the gym you just see the end result. So you learning this second language. I’m learning Spanish as well. That just wasn’t classroom. This was outside of the classroom books and moving through friends and everything. And so if somebody continues to practice their speech by recording themselves polls and listening their pauses and trigger words, and maybe use a thesaurus to find more similes to expand their vocabulary. So it’s more diplomatic, more strategic, then there’ll be much more effective will and much more wealthy if that’s what they’ll grow.
Rolando Rosas 35:15
Hey, if you told me this is how to get more of your calls, and these are the tips you’ve seen over the last 15 years that work with ABS would want to put those in place. And that leads me to the other thing I wanted to ask you about, because the nature of your industry is call, right. That’s the first word in there. Do you still find pains, you have such wonderful wealth of knowledge over the years of numerous campaigns? Are people still picking up the phones from folks they don’t know, maybe they’re getting cold call we we wrestle with this in our staff meetings, when it comes to marketing and strategy and what where to park our dollars when it comes to different types of campaigns, I take it that you’re still a proponent of calling people and find that to be effective. Tell me if I’m a skeptic, I’m a skeptic out there. I’m one of those people, I don’t think calling works anymore. Tell me why I’m misguided.
Richard Blank 36:16
The last thing that I want to get is an omni channel non voice support either a chat or an email, because it can be miscommunicated. The next thing while I’m trying to speak to someone pressing zero, and elevated, I’m angry. When you speak with somebody, you have a chance to maybe retain that client, you can get a referral out of that if you’re looking to upsell, or let’s just look at it as a worst case scenario, Rolando, you can also get an exit interview, this individual may take the time to tell you what you need to do in order to improve or what your competition had done in order to earn their business. So by just limiting it to non voice, I believe that you’re restricting any sort of relationship building and incredibly important feedback that your company needs in real time in order to make certain adjustments.
Rolando Rosas 37:15
Wow, tremendous, tremendous. So it’s still you can still gain valuable insights and knowledge from the call versus like you said, the nonverbal communication that comes through as a chat or an email. Tremendous. So I’m going to ask you, and we’ll give you one word. And I want your take this is a rapid fire questions on a thumbs up, or thumbs down. And so there’s no right or wrong answer. It’s your answer. All right. So first one up, cold calling.
Richard Blank 37:48
Absolutely. Well, let me share my phone, strangers or friends you haven’t met yet? Absolutely.
Rolando Rosas 37:55
All right. That’s a whopping thumbs up. trade shows
Richard Blank 37:59
I guess I would give it a thumbs up because once again, it’s a face to face, you’re able to see people
Rolando Rosas 38:03
social media.
Richard Blank 38:05
I say thumbs down.
Rolando Rosas 38:06
Oh, social media. Okay, duly noted.
Richard Blank 38:10
Because everyone’s putting their best day on Facebook. They’re not showing the 99% other stuff.
Rolando Rosas 38:15
Last one I want to ask you about on this thumbs up thumbs down, online meetings, Zoom teams, these collaboration platforms, what do you think thumbs up or thumbs down?
Richard Blank 38:26
I wish I could do a middle middle and give it a thumbs up because it does more good than harm, but people abuse it. They’ll do a lot of long meetings, which I don’t think is fair. Sometimes people feel a lot of pressure to doll themselves up or to have certain backgrounds that can be judgments there. I think in normal conversations that people have a moment where people’s eyes could be somewhere else. But on these sort of calls, this is almost 1984 where you’re just literally being looked at the entire time which may or may not be comfortable for somebody so you may or may not get the true reactions of somebody. But then again, you and I seeing each other for the first time this is 10 times better than just a phone call and if I haven’t seen someone a good friend for the longest time, I’ve almost reaching through the camera to hug them. So it has its pros and cons business wise I give it a medium. But I think on a social solder you and I are things like that. It is such icing on the cake. It really does make a difference. Yes.
Rolando Rosas 39:32
You can certain you could certainly blanket a lot more people. And for me, I’ve had the curved back my travels so I had to rely on more and more that I would love to be I would have in the last two years. Still traveling to seeing people shake their hands. There’s nothing like sitting down at a table with a client or with a supplier or partner and having discussions. I heard recently that when you do that it only takes a few minutes and they’ve met Should this scientifically the brains get in sync from communicating with somebody. And that’s something that obviously the value of being face to face with somebody getting in sync, that the brain synchronize, that the ideas can flow, there’s a lot to be said for that. Some of that you lose, obviously online, because you don’t have the ability to completely have that person right in front of you. Like, everything could be cool from the waist up, and then you’re just wearing shorts or whatever, or you’re not really in an environment that’s conducive for those communications. But anyways, and go on about that. But anyway, so medium thumbs for online communications. I got two more questions for you here. No right or wrong answer. Favorite musician or musical group
Richard Blank 40:45
INSX favorite singer Michael Hutchins.
Rolando Rosas 40:50
There you go. Two very good ones. And lastly, you’re in Costa Rica. You get all kinds of good food. What’s your favorite food when it comes to either at home eating or going out to eat?
Richard Blank 41:01
my Racecourse? We have the freshest seafood in Costa Rica. Lango.
Rolando Rosas 41:08
To Great as the best little smart east coast. What’s your favorite muddy school? What do you like? Do you like to use it?
Richard Blank 41:14
Absolutely. I’ll pretty much eat anything but the local Langosta us camera. It’s incredible what they have here, this sort of and it’s so fresh, and our ferias they love sourdoughs. Every time I go to the farmers market, the exotic fruit, it’s the prices are still so affordable to eat healthy, and to enjoy your life. And so I’m very fortunate here, it’s one of the benefits of living in Central America.
Rolando Rosas 41:39
That is so true. I’m on the east coast. So by the time the produce is picked in California and arrives at the supermarket here a week, maybe two goes by, or even longer. If it comes on a boat from somewhere, it could be a month it refrigerate and send it over here in Costa Rica and Panama does the same thing. It takes a day to two maximum from Boyd’s pick, put on a truck and it’s in the supermarket in right at your table at home.
Richard Blank 42:05
I love it though. We were spoiled. And we know
Rolando Rosas 42:08
oh jealous. I gotta tell you, I’m jealous of my cousins. I live in Panama for that reason, fruits tastes so much better there. They could pick them ripe essentially, instead of green with no taste.
Richard Blank 42:19
And don’t kid yourself. There are certain times when you get off the beaten path and you’re out in the Silva and all of a sudden you’re picking things off at trees, and eating like that. And that’s one of the things that made me fall in love with my wife, she was just showing me about the beauty of Costa Rica and explaining things that was like the Discovery Channel and I really enjoyed it.
Rolando Rosas 42:39
It’s wonderful beans, fresh Pena’s fresh mangoes, all the all that stuff. It’s just a love it you can talk on and on the second. Yes, we got to do a second one just to us on all that stuff. I want to give you the opportunity to put whatever you’d like a pointer tip, whatever you’d like to say as we close here that’s on your chest on your mind to Alright,
Richard Blank 43:03
thank you so much, once again for having me as your guest to Rolando, your gentlemen enjoy the time it flew by fast. But my one bit of advice for your amazing audience is Fortune favors the brave. And there may be some naysayers and great believers out there. But stay strong. Hold your course die with your boots on. And if you have a vision quest is spiritual life journey things inside you that are pulling you somewhere. I think by all means you should take it. So you can look at yourself in the mirror and be exceptionally proud of yourself. And I guess I followed through with that commitment I gave to myself at 18 years old when I decided to study Spanish as a major in college instead of finance and business. So I was true to myself and fulfilled that sort of journey. But you can once again buy a plane ticket come visit me in Costa Rica. If someone wants to come down here, give me a call triple 82716750 or just find me on my Facebook fan page where we’re going to be putting this interview here. So you’re going to be getting 10,000 Local Costa Ricans, I’m gonna love you as well. And I think this was excellent today. We’re alone.
Rolando Rosas 44:10
I don’t give up on our last
Richard Blank 44:12
post request system. Most casinos Of course you have.
Rolando Rosas 44:17
Absolutely, absolutely. So Richard, it is been a pleasure having you on. I want to thank our sponsor Global Teck Worldwide for the podcast today. And also want to recognize some past guests that were on there. Aaron in London actually he just moved to Bali so hopefully that your ventures are going well in Bali and no he moved out there. He’s a digital nomad. So Aaron, hopefully that’s going well for you. Felicia Dunmore who was on here a couple of episodes ago Felicia, you’re doing a bang up job out there on TikTok killing it killing it. You gotta give me some more lessons I got to learn from a pro and no, you may not be on TikTok Richard, but I’m telling you there’s a lot of stuff in the business world happening there. There aren’t a lot businesses on TikTok and TikTok is overtaken all the platforms when it comes to views in every metric. If you want some pointers, I can hook you up with Felicia too, because she is the queen of TikTok. Right now, when it comes to how to get an audience and pull them in. I think we covered it all today. Richard, thank you for coming on today. It’s been an absolute pleasure. We have to do this again. Because there’s so many other things I wanted to ask you and we just run out of time today. But thank you for coming on today.
Richard Blank 45:27
pleasure was mine, Rolando. Thank you so much.
Outro 45:30
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